well, this is now the most serious fighting we've seen since this latest taliban offensive began. the militants had already had captured vast swathes of rural territory, now they're trying to take their first city and earlier this evening, they made their way to the very centre of lashkar gah before being pushed back by afghan special forces. in the last few hours, a number of air strikes have been launched against taliban positions there, too. but fighting has been taking place elsewhere, as well. around herat in the west of afghanistan and kandahar in the south. caught in the middle of this, of course, ordinary afghan families. tens of thousands of people have had to flee their homes in recent weeks. and the international military mission here will formally come to an end by september with the taliban emboldened, peace talks stalled, everyone's worried that in the coming weeks, the violence is going to get even worse. kemal kirisci is a senior fellow at the brookings institute and has written about the mass exodus that's happening as the taliban's

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